P Diddy sued in $12m age discrimination claim

A New York woman has sued Sean "Diddy" Combs for age discrimination, saying the rapper-producer fired her two decades after she helped launch his career.

Francesca Spero, of Malverne, filed the age discrimination lawsuit Wednesday in federal court in Manhattan. The lawsuit says the 51-year-old woman introduced Combs to hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons and Uptown Records after meeting Combs in 1988. It says she worked at Bad Boy Entertainment as an executive 12 years before being fired in March.

The lawsuit says she was fired after hip surgery and confiding to an executive that she was treated for a drug dependency relapse.

A publicist for Combs released a statement saying "there are many reasons why Ms. Spero is no longer employed by Bad Boy, but age discrimination is not 1 of them."